I've had a SBZ in the past that crapped out on me, now on a SBZ. Just more noticing I'm getting a crackling/pop noise in certain games, but sadly even when I took out the SBZ and tried the onboard also making me think it's some sort of weird interference inside my case?
 
I was wondering would any other "high-end" soundcards make sense? Seems like it's the same lot of the bunch and I solely only use headphones so ideally including a headphone amp and other features for such. Or would a DAC/AMP combo make more sense and possibly remove that crackling/pop but my concern is in games with certain audio features if they'd work properly.
 
Any opinions on all this? It'd be much appreciated since it's driving me crazy.

Can you elaborate a bit more on:

- The rest of the computer, like what operating system it uses, what expansion slot options it has, etc

- The "cracking/pop" noise. Please try to be very specific as to what it sounds like, and if it does not occur all the time, please try to be very specific in correlating it to something you do (e.g. "I move the mouse and I hear a sound, if I don't move the mouse, I don't hear a sound").

Generally speaking if you're using a modern Windows platform, there is no need for a "gaming specific" audio card, because we're over a decade beyond hardware audio for gaming; it's all software based, and the game is handling its own business internally. Now, that doesn't mean its doing the best job ever of it, but you don't need a DSP-assisted board to make it work. The driver package on whatever soundcard may offer some functionality you like (like HRTF) or you can add that in with software (e.g. Razer Surround) so don't feel "chained" to the "gaming soundcard" genre - there are more hardware agnostic solutions available today than ever before.

As far as specific suggestions, the sky is really the limit - there are plenty of good soundcards, and other devices out there that can drive your headphones and interface with your computer. Do you have a budget in mind?